Kand

Automatic transmissions.
Sculpture.
Lorde.
The British Museum.
 
Automatic transmissions are for people too lazy to learn to drive properly. Sculpture just really annoys me. It isn't interesting or exciting or capable of producing an emotional response. Lorde is a cartoon hedonist. The British Museum is way too crowded, with tourists taking selfies in front of the Rosetta Stone preventing you from getting more any more than a brief glimpse at the thing, and the rest of the museum is simply loads of stuff looted by British noblemen from the four corners of the globe.

Hoefler Text.

The poor Ivy Leaguer... boo effing hoo!

The poor Ivy Leaguer... boo effing hoo!

I will admit that for what I want to do UCSD is probably the best school in the country-- imaging for neuroscience
There is a certain faculty member who left Stanford and helped found Instagram, James Hollan (infographic expert) and many many many notable people in the neuroscience/radiology fields
 
San Diego is the neurotech capital of the country which was recognized by the President and governor (Cal BRAIN initiave), but even after all this, it still doesn't have much clout and I'm sorry but that really matters to me.

In undergrad, I did mediocre....I had very strong semesters and other not so strong. I was undergoing depression. Now I'm in a PhD program at UCSD and quite frankly I'm embarrassed. I really did not want to start school again after undergrad...I honestly need a break. I graduated from an Ivy League and am deep in debt.
I am embarrassed to be attending UCSD quite frankly. UCSD ranks number 15 or so in my field ...name and prestige really matters. And I went to an Ivy League school that people don't recognize the name of (hint: it's been consistently ranked 4th in US news after Yale) on the west coast. It annoys me because people know about Stanford but my school was ranked just as high, if not better, yet people on the west coast are unfamiliar with it.
My undergrad grades weren't terrible, however, I am going to get straight As in graduate school and quit after I get my masters...it should only take me one year and a quarter.
After that I want to go to an Ivy, MIT, Stanford or Berkeley.
 
I honestly won't be happy unless I graduate from a top school.
People's ignorance about Columbia annoys me...it's an Ivy League school for Christ's sake.
But I remember someone on the west coast saying, "Columbia's the most expensive school? I don't get it..it's not Harvard or anything." I was just too dumbfounded to say anything. And my sibling goes to Harvard and everyone knows about Harvard and it's annoying when I see the reaction when I say my sibling goes to Harvard and people have no reaction about Columbia because they don't realize it's one of the top schools in the country. I love NYC and I wouldn't trade my years there for anything in the world but I'm tired of not being good enough, I know I'm capable.

Who you think you are to determine am i qualified enough or not? You're at the utmost expectations are a grad student who got several rejections before gotten admitted. Have you seen my reseach papers? Did you know that I am with a continuous contact with American University, Harvard Kennedy School (Government Dept), Duke University, Georgetown University, Texas at Austin University faculty members are cooperating in several academic papers and they actually have shown interests for my papers to reference in their academic subfields?

I am in terms of an undergrad & Grad GPA (yes am a grad student), english proficiency tests, experiences, extracurricular activities, achievements (two books on comparative politics, published article) and honors. I am qualified to apply to about 85% of the US grad programs in my major, the one and only defect which is in my profile is my low GRE scores WHICH can be fixed by studying which I NEVER did when I took my once and only GRE, hence it is very logical to occur.

I have proven that I am eligible in english proficiency tests in both in the IELTS and TOEFL. I have scored a 7.5/9 in the IELTS listening & speaking portions which is equivalent to 27/30 on TOEFL. I have scored a 23/30 writing on TOEFL before 3 years without even practicing and my vocabulary and grammar were less mature than now.

Empirically, I am Qualified to be a competitive applicant except that I have to WORK on my GRE which is doable. Remember english is my second language & I speak generally three languages, Native in Arabic, full fluency in English, average in French.

You have 0 qualifications to evaluate and judge my profile.

By doing something other than moping.

Very little of what you’ve attempted to articulate here makes sense and what does is riddled with inherent contradiction and hypocrisy. Based on your comments thus far, it is evident that you and I represent two different mindsets about discrimination and how it should be handled and thus this conversation is largely fruitless. As you didn’t seem to understand my comments, let me clarify:
My comment about education was purely to point out that you should know better than to dismiss pejorative language. I wasn’t touting that education is an inherent end to discrimination. Those of us who are educated, though, should recognize the harmful nature of using divisive language and strive to eliminate it. There are absolutely material differences between the N-word and being called a cracker, however I reject your implication that the use of the latter term is somehow acceptable. I’ve said it multiple times and I’ll say it again: discrimination and slurs toward any group is harmful to society.  Everyone does deserve respect. Your implication that people don’t is very telling about your character.  "Thirdly, I do not want to be part of your solution if it is characterized by a praxis of supposedly equity in which everyone always already deserves respect. Do people of color, queer folks, trans people, disabled folks, the poor and the ill get respect already? I am just not here for anyone centering white people's feelings or coddling us in order to talk about respect, or about ending discrimination, or anything at all really.” This passage is so poorly constructed that it’s hard to find your meaning, but the implication seems to be that the only people who deserve respect are minorities, which is simply untrue. Everyone deserves respect. Your assertion that people don’t is very telling about your character and exposes the mindset behind your ideological standpoint that racial slurs toward majority groups are acceptable.  We've always been coddled, why would it be useful to continue to do so if we were trying to imagine a world in which everyone is ~*equal*~? Again, the message of your sentence is lost in the poor quality of its construction. (By the way, your term “we’ve” implies that you and I are of the same majority group. The fact of the matter is that I’m of a minority group that is regularly marginalized in American society.) You seem to be arguing that not uttering racial slurs against a majority group is the equivalent of “coddling.” Sorry, but no. It’s possible to promote equality for all groups in a way that isn’t destructive to one. Based on your previous posts, I have a feeling that this discussion is going to do little to change your mind and I don’t care to engage in further conversation with you. Best of luck in your future aspirations.  

There are so many subtle and overt things in what you said that just don't sit well with me. First off, touting one's education isn't useful to ending "discrimination" and it especially isn't useful to ending class-based oppression (which is always already complicated along racialized and gendered lines). Secondly, if you cannot recognize the very real material differences between a black person being called the n-word and a white person being called a cracker, then we will just have to stop the discussion now because I cannot abide that. Thirdly, I do not want to be part of your solution if it is characterized by a praxis of supposedly equity in which everyone always already deserves respect. Do people of color, queer folks, trans people, disabled folks, the poor and the ill get respect already? I am just not here for anyone centering white people's feelings or coddling us in order to talk about respect, or about ending discrimination, or anything at all really. We've always been coddled, why would it be useful to continue to do so if we were trying to imagine a world in which everyone is ~*equal*~?

I find it horribly tragic that educated individuals pursuing graduate study can study discrimination for a living in an effort to stop it, all the while preaching that it is okay to use derogatory language. If you ever want the world to change, you need to treat everyone with respect and stop justifying hate speech.  The ideological mindset you preach toward your “wonderbread cousins” is what perpetuates racism and pejorative behaviors. Your diction is divisive and serves to reinforce racial divides.  
 
In short: You are part of the problem, not part of the solution. 

yeah so like...there are indeed already white heterosexual men in women's studies. and half the time the ones that are "accepted" so to speak in my experience are trans guys who ID as straight. And like...I have a LOT of feelings about trans men in women's studies spaces (just like I have a lot of feels about cis straight white men in women's studies spaces). But honestly like this should be a non-issue. I think that the gender studies, the women's studies, the feminist studies, the whatever the hell studies should operate under the assumption that anyone who enrolls in the class is 1) interested and 2) willing to learn and 3) willing to UNLEARN (just as important). If anyone, regardless of who the person is via identity politics, does not do one or more of those three things...why are they there?
 
also i really need all my wonderbread cousins in here to stop getting so riled up about ~*slurs*~ like whitey and cracker. you're aware that whitey was created in direct response to terms like darkie and that cracker LITERALLY means the one who cracks the whip...a reference to being the MASTER in the context of chattel slavery...so...even if it is insulting what it calls you out on is your white guilt, not whatever parallel negative presuppositions there might be about BEING white. just saying y'all. just sayin. so calm it down.

just wrote a long ass blog post that was deleted
 
in a nutshell:
if you have the option, goto princeton: no other program has demonstrated the ability to place ALL students in solid postions (both ROCKSTARS and not)
if you cant do princeton, harvard and berk set you up to do just as well as pton if you end up being a rockstar
otherwise, the usual suspects--wisc, mich, chicago, duke, etc.--give you equal "chance" to the lottery of placement
 
DO NOT GO TO SOC GRAD SCHOOL IF NOT TOP 20. if so, do it at your own risk (risk of unemployment, underemployment, making less than 50k in your thrties if lucky etc). clearly folks here CAN do ok, but be a social scientist for a second, how different are you?

I don't want to sound like I'm the son of a theoretical sociologist professor father with a strong background in economics and who has written the Beginner's Book on Kapital...
 
but Capitalism is the cause of most ills in our society.

Thank you so much for your responses.
 
I think I am rather normal, but I also think the typical hyper-capitalistic, American livelihood that I loathe is the actual abnormality to human nature. My "unnatural" livelihood is being rejected, so the status quo calls me depressed. Thus, people say that I need to take some medication so that I can fit back in line. 

I came here (as a nameless current grad in the MFA Art program at UCSB) to ask why YOU didn't apply, do YOU even know that we have a program with crazy good facilities, great faculty, and an INSANE location with a pretty close proximity to LA?

I know the deadline has passed for this year for us, so this may not be of use for a lot of you looking at programs. But the thing that gets me is that we had all of one person come to visit the program before applying and to be completely honest, our applications were pretty dismal this year (minus a few in my opinion).

I decided to come here because I was getting crazy good funding, a huge studio, great faculty, and the program matched my needs as far as freedom was concerned.

Its an open question to all, I'm not asking you to go to our website and criticize what you see. I'm asking if anyone recommended it to you, or if you ever saw "recruiters" at portfolio days, or anything at all. I'll be honest, I didn't at all, and I actually visited on a whim when I was accepted last year. What I saw blew my mind because I couldn't believe that no one had told me about this place..

What's amazing about this thread is this person ADMITS UC-Berkeley is a bad fit and is still sour that they got rejected, were given a form letter, and that they had to follow American standard procedures to apply to American graduate schools. 
 
How is Berkeley the arrogant one here, if you know you're a bad fit? It's as simple as doing the research to find it you are, or aren't. 

Poor foreign people like me don't get fee waivers for either those things.
 
So we apply $100 to look up a form email instead of even an email with my name on that. Still can be form, just send the rejection instead of treating me like this lab rat following a trail. But you don't get it, you want your system to work, you want to believe that is better than all the alternatives etc.
 
But sigh at most of the response here. You're American and this is all you've ever known but and I know you have to live in that system every day, but I think you should have very little faith in these systems and that they will have given more than minimal attention to your file.
 
So I'm glad you're not feeling degraded as I feel by this style of rejection, the actual way in which you get an email saying check another place and what? It's sad when you dont' feel that any more.

The mere idea that your SO should get an expedited, or implied positive, admission result because you've been accepted in another program is offensive to me on a very base level.
 
Just be aware, for every positive notion you'll get in regards to the sitiation.. people like me exist and might be on the adcomm of the other program. Just suggesting any sort of preferential treatment would be playing with fire. Rather, more like dousing yourself in jet fuel and then jumping into a volcano.
 
There are not words to properly express how quickly I'd find every flaw in a pending application and banish it to the rejection heap if this sort of things was brought up.

I agree, but for a lot of people who post on these sorts of forums.. the academia is the goal, not the research or education or anything else.. academia.. their life is academia.

I didn't say my childhood justifies my negativity. What I'm trying to say is that my negativity isn't a choice. I am in constant pain. I can try all I like to be positive, it doesn't work. I do not know how to manufacture feelings, if you do I'd be interested to learn how. 
 
If it's not a contest, why are you telling me what happened to you? Why do you think I would care? It seems like you're saying that your difficult childhood justifies your unkindness to me. It doesn't. You say you don't like it when people assume they've had the hardest life. I did not say that I've had the hardest life possible--those are words you put into my mouth. And yet you make it sound like you've had the hardest life, and that justifies your jackassery. 
 
You're known to come off as an asshole? Maybe it's becaue you are an asshole... just a thought worth considering.
 
I never said everyone in my program hates me. A couple of professors and one student--the other students and the other professors have been fine to me.
 
Get the help I need? Um, I've been trying to do that since I was a teenager with absolutely no luck. Should I just put my life on hold forever?
 
Seriously... I regret posting here. You know how I said that seeking help always comes back to bite me? I guess this is yet another example of it. I was only asking for help. Like it or not, you made me feel worse. There is no good outcome here. Do you really enjoy doing this to people?

I don't really like when people assume they've had the hardest life. I don't know what happened to you and I don't want you to tell me (this isn't a contest), but my parents were both drug addicts who died when I was young and I slept on the New York City trains as a kid. So when you come around here saying things that other people did to you when you were growing up justifies your negativity is a bit insulting. 
 
It also seems like you take things too personally. I'm known on GradCafe to come off as an asshole sometimes, and maybe my original comment was a bit rough, but I don't think it was as mean and unhelpful as you interpreted it to be. The reason I asked those questions was because I just have a hard time believing that everyone in your grad program hates you as much as you made it seem. These are educated and professional people. They don't accept students just to make their lives miserable. Usually when someone feels like the world is against them, I think either 1) it's all in their head, or 2) something about their personality rubs people the wrong way. 
 
And lastly, your attachment and resentment issues seem pretty serious and it makes me think that you would have a similar situation in any grad program. In my opinion, there are two ways to handle the situation: 1) Get the help you need before enrolling in a grad program. 2) Recognize that the grad program (and the people) isn't the problem, and separate your grad studies from your personal issues. 

Wow... that was a really mean reply.
 
So I guess as long as I have been unhappy before, I must be unable to perceive anything normally. Maybe I'm also getting paid $5000/month and my attitude is making it seem like less?
 
Maybe the reason crappy things happen to me all the time is people like you, who blame me whenever I suffer and who think that the fact that I am suffering is evidence that I'm full of s***.

I don't freaking believe this.
 
I just added up all of my grades in my business class and it's an 89.9
 
I'm so pissed. Partly, because a lot of this class is subjective. We had a group project and essays on both of the exams.
 
Do you guys think the professor will round up? She really doesn't seem like a hard a$$. She also seems to like me and we had pretty good rapport. I'm really stressed though.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EL8e2ujXe8g